


"...more than he loved himself."

by anti_ela



Category: Daredevil (TV), The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: F/M, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Post-Episode: s01e08 The Defenders
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-23
Updated: 2017-08-23
Packaged: 2018-12-18 22:35:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11884263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anti_ela/pseuds/anti_ela
Summary: Call him crazy, but Foggy didn't think dying was particularly romantic. Bouquets of sharpened pencils, bowties folded like roses, sure. But funerals?





	"...more than he loved himself."

Call him crazy, but Foggy didn't think dying was particularly romantic. Bouquets of sharpened pencils, bowties folded like roses, sure. But funerals?

"I'm buying you a cheap headstone, you son of a bitch," he informs the clipboard. Waiting rooms for funeral homes. Figures.

> **Name:** Matthew Murdock  
>  **Date of Birth:**

His birthday. Matt's birthday.

The pencil lead breaks.

Foggy blinks at it, then pulls a sharpener from his briefcase. The shavings curl away and fall as he slowly twists the shaft. When he stops, it's shorter than it should be, and his pants sport a small pile of graphite dust and wood shavings. He brushes it off onto a sheet of paper and sets it on the plastic chair next to him.

He fills out the rest of data neatly. Flips the page—the headstone form. He pulls out the corresponding catalogue replete with stone, illustration, and font choices. He turns the laminated pages, automatically noting the least suitable choices by reflex.

"If you don't want a trout and 'noodlin' champ 2013' in comic sans on your eternal monument, speak now or forever hold your peace."

He closes his eyes and tilts his head back to rest it against the wall. Air from the vent overhead ruffles his hair.

"Nothing, huh? Alright. Alright."

Foggy gathers the forms, the trash, his briefcase, the coffee cup he hadn't touched. Walks to the receptionist, says enough words to seem normal, pays with one card or another. He dumps the trash and cup and starts the long walk home.

Things Matt Murdock loved more than he loved himself, in no especial order: stale bagels, cigarette butts, used diapers. He loved dumpster fires with more passion. Corrupt politicians, embezzling doctors, and petty tyrants held a lofier position in his hierarchy.

He'd break his knuckles to save a thief. He'd bury himself so a murderer wouldn't die alone.

That wasn't fair, really. But when Luke had told Foggy what Matt had said, that he wanted to save her, well. Foggy knew what that lie meant.

If Elektra was going to die, Matt would die. Simple as that. As obvious and inevitable as the moon rising over the sea, at least to Matt and those who knew him.

Maybe just to Foggy.

He was at his building before he noticed he was crying. No point in wiping the tears away; Marci would know anyway.

He ascends the stairs watching his feet. One step up, another, another, until he's at his landing. One foot in front of the other until he's at his door, until he's through it, until he's at the bed.

Marci's there, but he didn't register her kiss as she takes his briefcase, her caress as she pulls him down. Every breath a battle, every inhale a gulp, every exhale a stuttering gasp. His fingers tangle in her hair and clutch at her shoulders. She pulls him in, envelopes him, speaks softly in his hair.

Between sobs, he cries, "He's gone—he's gone—I loved him."

"I know," she says, though he can't hear. "I know."


End file.
